He draws his pen closer to mine and constantly taps my pen. My focus is on the page I just flipped, so I only attend to his signals after a short while. He's requesting for battle, but I retreat, rejecting his request. 'You never rejected a pencil war request before.' He sighs. 'Yeah, that was before you cut my wrist and let me bleed.' . . . All hell has broken loose, and one of its demons has lost its lease. Ginorito is finally in the place he's always dreamed of - top of his class, recently elected RCL, and surrounded by people he can rely on. Everything is falling into place, until a ghost from his past walks back into his life. Anicle, the boy who once made his primary school life a misery, has transferred into Ginorito's new school. Ginorito doesn't want to cross paths with him but Anicle, who comes from a troubled background, has plans of his own. Given the chance to meet again, Anicle uses this opportunity to seek redemption and at the same time, discover more about his sexuaity now that he is on his own in a new school. Is Anicle worth Ginorito's forgiveness? Is it just so that they could be friends again? Or maybe, something even stronger? Set in 2023, A Beautiful Thing is a coming-of-age story that explores pain, memory, redemption, and queer identity with honesty and heart Happy Reading.